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Mother3

Do yourself a favor, and recall way back into the past, back when Nintendo was the man, and Sega was crap. Not to insult Sega, but that's pretty much how all of us felt, or at least how I felt. Nintendo held a special place in my dark, cold heart, and I never wanted to let anything come between it and I. The SNES, specifically, was what made me love it oh so much. A videogame title, not receiving much hype before it was released in the U.S.A., had earned my obsession. Earthbound for the SNES was what I had determined to be the game of a lifetime. Thank God I was right, since I had purchased several disheartening games in the past. I was so overjoyed when I got it that I awoke before sunrise so I could select "new game" and start my adventure.

I played Earthbound and nothing else. I had never played an RPG before (yes, pity me), and this entire "turn-taking" method of fighting was new to me, much different than the typical side-scroller or fighting game I was used to. Seeing that I had no idea what I was doing, I promptly died on my way to see the meteorite for the first time. Did I get discouraged and immediately declare this game to be a piece of junk...maybe, but I continued on, enjoying every minute that a spiteful crow pecked at my eyes. Indeed, it was one of my happier videogame experiences.

After I had utterly destroyed Gigas, and found every single solitary secret hidden within the game, and talked to every NPC, I did it all over again. And again. And....then, somehow, I grew tired of trekking through Dusty Dunes Desert, exploring every floor of the Fourside Department Store, and fighting 5 moles. I wasn't sure why this had happened, but the excitement of Earthbound that had once existed grew thin. I longed for something more; something new and different.

The N64 was the next generation of console goodness. It possessed 3-dimensional graphics that didn't look like a glob of sprites, a la first generation PSX titles. I, of course, promptly bought one when it first came out. Yet, something was missing. I don't exactly remember, but I think the first glimpses of Mother 3 I caught were in a Nintendo Power that had covered Space World. This was what I had been waiting for! A new world to explore, with my favorite characters waiting for me to converse with them! Imagine heading over to Saturn Valley in delectable 3-D, and having to look up to see the upper floors of skyscrapers (assuming there would have been skyscrapers in this game). Every single piece of information released about Mother 3 I then started to gobble up, just like I had when Earthbound was announced for the SNES. I then realized that another joyous videogame experience would eventually ensue. A bit of disheartening news came when it was claimed that Mother 3 would use the 64DD, to allow to more expansive worlds and whatnot, but I figured that the price of a system expansion would be well worth it. And besides, a slew of new games were in the works for this uber system.

Mother 3: delayed, and delayed yet again. It seemed that Nintendo and associates were working extra hard to ensure that this game would be extra special, and have nothing left out. But still, info pertaining to the actual game was difficult to scrounge up. The 64DD was cancelled at one point, but I believe it was stated that Mother 3 could exist quite happily on just the N64. And then it hit me, like a ton of bricks, while reading the recently discovered gold-mine that is starmen.net. Mother 3 was cancelled! A profusion of expletives raced from my mouth as I re-read the line of text several more times. "Not possible," I thought. "They had put so much work into this game, and it was bound to be a success. How could they cancel it now!" Despite my attempted telepathic messages to Nintendo of Japan, the game remained cancelled. It then dawned upon me that there wouldn't be any new adventures, nor Mr. Saturns, nor anything Earthbound related, ever. For if this game was cancelled, what reason did they have to start working on another one?

Around this time, the Nintendo Gamecube was about to be, or had been, announced (forgive me if my recollections seem inaccurate...). An inkling of redemption seemed plausible. With this new piece of hardware, it would be foolish to not take the Mother 3 project from the vaporware closet and resurrect it. The graphics, gameplay, and everything else had the potential to be far better than originally envisioned. There was only one small problem...Sony, whom had originally infiltrated my home with its PSX, now bestowed upon me the PS2. I was quite enthralled to have it, I'll admit, with its super sharp graphics, and library of promising titles yet to come. Unfortunately, there was a problem with owning a next-gen console such as that, because there arose the dilemma of only being able to have one. In all seriousness, the Gamecube was never all that enticing to me. Rogue Squadron II was fun, but not $200+ fun, nor was Luigi's Mansion. I reconsidered, however, that eventually there would be some very fun titles available. Super Smash Brothers: Melee wouldn't bring me to get a Gamecube at that very moment, but if and when Mother 3 was released, I could purchase SSB:M too, albeit at a much lower price.

But as I finally re-enter the present time, I start to have doubts. I love my computer dearly, with its vast amount of mmorpgs and very good games for every genre. My PS2 keeps me content with arcade shoot-em-ups, and of course, Final Fantasy titles. Can I really come up with a good reason to buy a completely new console just so I can play Mother 3 when it's released? I'm not as enthusiastic about Earthbound as I once was, and if Mother 3 was released, I doubt I'd be that ecstatic about it. I don't know exactly why this is, but perhaps it's just the lack of Earthboundy goodness I've experienced over the years that has made Earthbound less special to me. Knowing that Mother 3 might indeed be released for the Gamecube almost seems disheartening to me, because I seemingly know for a fact that I will not be able to fully enjoy it.

Not-so-serious final ending statement: Here is where I insert words such as w00t, l337, pants, becuz, waz, ive, and other jibba-jabba jive talk that I tried to avoid placing in the paragraphs above. EB is still coo, and i lik ita lot, and every now and then ill start playing it again, or maybe even eb0. thats also neato. anywayz, i hopes that mother 3 is actually released, because itll make so many people happy and whatnot, and then i can mosey on over to my pal's house and play his copy of mother 3, so i wont be sad. heh, maybe i can even borrow his gamecube when he gets bored of it. ^_^